


What Dreams May Come

by little_ogre



Category: Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency (TV 2016)
Genre: Freeform, Idiots in Love, M/M, Some Swearing, dont start asking uncomfortable questions, gratuitous use of parenthesis, reference to mild violence, second season, second season teaser trailer, when the universe gives you makeouts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-04
Updated: 2017-09-04
Packaged: 2018-12-23 23:42:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,607
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12000381
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/little_ogre/pseuds/little_ogre
Summary: Mostly he sleeps and dreams about Farah and Todd coming to his rescue, through various different madcap adventures. They are always looking different, wearing fabulous outfits. Once he dreams that they are electric eels, having worked out that the easiest way to spring Dirk would be filling the building with water and swim in. The Todd-eel is blue like his eyes and the Farah-eel has a tiny wisp of springy hair on its head, and carries a tiny gun in the curl of its tail.





	What Dreams May Come

**Author's Note:**

> Arrives way late to the party with a hopeful look, maracas and a one-trick pony.

In captivity Dirk has a lot of dreams about Todd.

The facility is mostly like he remembers it from his youth, but with worse hair and less acne this time around. Some of the tests are painful and horrible, but the tedious ones are worse, sometimes hours and hours in a chair against a blank wall and not having any idea of what they want or what they are trying to achieve, just the same question over and over again. It seems it doesn’t matter if he answers or refuse to answer, it just goes on and on relentlessly. They won’t let him have any books, they won’t let him have any of his own clothes, no cool jackets in bright colours anymore, he hadn’t know how much he enjoyed deciding for himself what he was going to wear until it was taken away from him. He misses his flamingo tie, and his yellow leather jacket and most of all he misses Todd’s _Mexican Funeral_ t-shirt (Dirk didn’t struggle when they took it off him, remembering that Todd don’t have too many of them left and he hopes irrationally that they might return it, as a reward for good behaviour).

 

It’s not like they are making any progress with the test anyway. Dirk has always said he is not psychic, he only gets hunches, he won’t be able to predict the number on the card face-down in front of him on the table, no matter if they pump him full of drugs or suspend him upside down in water. However hunches are definitely not what these people are after. These are serious scientists with clipboards and charts and a complete disregard for Dirk as a person, only that he can do something interesting that they can poke and prod. After hours and hours of trying, so tired that he can feel exhaustion like strange gritty film in his eye lobes the only thing that comes to mind is that somebody really hate the smell of bubblegum, somebody else really needs the bathroom and….

“Very erectus?” he says into the quiet, it makes a ripple of not laughter go around the room, a vein in Sgt Friedkin’s forehead bulge and earns him an extra cup of chocolate pudding on his dinner tray.

It’s really not what they are after. So Dirk gets up and wears scratchy nondescript clothing, eats bland food, is interminably bored (and sometimes in pain and despair but he tries not to think about that so much) and has a lot of dreams about Todd, and about Farah, and sometimes about Amanda and The Rowdy Three. They are just ordinary dreams though, they’re not hunches and absolutely not prophetic ones. They attach electrons to his head to monitor even this, and Dirk spends a week sleeping until Sgt Friedkin throws lab manager’s clipboard through the one way mirror wall and that’s the end of that.

Mostly he sleeps and dreams about Farah and Todd coming to his rescue, through various different madcap adventures. They are always looking different, wearing fabulous outfits. Once he dreams that they are electric eels, having worked out that the easiest way to spring Dirk would be filling the building with water and swim in. The Todd-eel is blue like his eyes and the Farah-eel has a tiny wisp of springy hair on its head, and carries a tiny gun in the curl of its tail. The lab assistant setting up the instruments can’t stop humming “Oooooh gurl, shock me like…” the whole day.

 

The door slams opens and Todd skitters in, slamming it shut behind him. He doesn’t look strange, he’s not wearing gear or a mask, he just looks like he always does, scruffy beard, close cropped hair and big blue eyes. Todd looking put upon and a little tired, soft pants and bare feet.

Dirk rolls out of the bed immediately anyway. Just in case. He sleeps in his sneakers these days,just to be ready. That is not a hunch either. “Todd! You came!” he exclaims, delight making him completely inane.

Todd doesn’t answer straight away, just walks over and wraps his arms around Dirk’s waist. He’s so short he can tuck his head neatly under his chin. Dirk can’t remember if Todd has ever hugged him before, held hands half-naked to connect an electric ghost rhino yes, but hugging no. After a while he raises his face to Dirk, just holding it up clearly expecting something which Dirks doesn’t know what it is. They look at each other for an exceedingly awkward moment before Todd lets him go.

“Are we leaving now?” Dirk asks.

“That was the plan,” Todd says with resignation in his voice and realisation slowly hits Dirk.

“They got you too?” he asks dismayed. “Oh bloody hell” he says and sits down on the of the bed again. Todd seems remarkably calm about it, shrugging, sitting down next to him. “Bollocks! Poppycock! And, and other strong words to such effect. I was really counting on you and Farah to get me out of here.”

Todd smiles sadly at him, and it’s so familiar and well known it nearly breaks Dirk’s heart. To think he had been without friends for 16 years and now he has three (he is not sure if he is going to count the Rowdy 3 by virtue of being Amanda’s friends, not until they’ve had a talk about that whole eating energy thing which feels like getting hit by a bus, but tentatively he has pencilled in seven friends).

“It all went to hell very fast,” Todd says, looking at his feet. “I think Farah got away though, so now we have to count on her. And the squid.”

“The squid?” “They are natural break-out artists, and have three hearts. It was really good for getting us in touch with an underground network of spy clams.”

“ Spy clam?” Dirk waves his hands, “You’re making no sense. That’s making no sense.”

Todd rolls his eyes and looks grumpier than ever, he seems somewhat wrong footed as if he is waiting for something to happen. “You are so annoying. This is the worst rescue attempt ever,” he huffs and curls up on the bed, his back to Dirk, arms crossed and his shoulder blades warm against Dirks lower back. His feet are tucked in, underneath each other, they are bare and look strangely defenseless. It is always a little cold in Dirk’s cell, he can never tell if it’s day or night.

“Anyway, what happened to your shoes?” he asks, resisting the urge to chafe Todd’s feet with his hands. They look cold.

“The squid,”Todd muttered darkly and curled up a little tighter. Dirk lies down carefully so they are lying back to back on the single bed, shoulder blades touching. Todd feels warm against his back, if he leans his head back only a little their skulls would be touching too. And even though Todd getting captured is the second worst thing that has ever happened to Dirk, it still feels comforting.

“So, anything that’s happened in the world? How is Farah, and Amanda? Is she still with the Rowdy Three?”

“I don’t want to talk about it,” Todd says, and then: “We never talk about that.”

“We don’t?” Dirk asks, baffled. He can’t imagine why they wouldn’t talk about that. He really likes Amanda, he really likes how she and Todd stuck together and helped each other. He wants to know if she has managed to forgive Todd for being a massive arsehole. Todd sighs hugely, clearly recognizing that Dirk won’t let it go.

“Amanda is pretty damn upset what with everything,” he says. “She still won’t really speak to me,” Todd said. “But she’s made me set up this plan to pay our parents back, so that’s what I’ll be doing for the next 25 years. After all this is settled and we get you back of course.” Dirk likes how he says that as if was the obvious thing to do, and how confident he sounds that it will happen even though Todd is currently here in Dirk’s cell, just as stuck as he is. It makes him want to try some confidence of his own.

“Well, I can assure you your new promotion to ward at my detective agency will be very lucrative. The universe pays very well.” Todd puffs out a breath of laughter, it sounds slightly wet around the edges.

“Didn’t I turn that down? Right before…” he cut himself off abruptly.

“Right before what?” Todd only groaned and twisted on the bunk, coming round to look at Dirk.

“This is not usually how it goes,” he said with a displeased frown.

“What?” Dirk said as Todd impatiently pulled at his arm, tugging him around so that they ended up spooning, Dirk curled around Todd’s back.

“Does this usually happen?” he asked confused, he was a little uncertain about the whole friendship thing since Todd was his first proper friend but he wasn’t exactly sure this was within the parameters of “two sane guys doing normal things”, Not that he could put his finger on exactly what was insane about it but still. Spooning in a bed in a military facility for top secret research on parapsychological phenomena isn’t the most irrational thing he’s ever done, that thing with the Morris dancers and the Cornish goat rescue springs to mind just for example, but it’s still pretty strange. However, Dirk has not gotten to where he is, i.e the nation’s leading holistic detective, by questioning the universe when it is putting him in pretty strange positions. Although this is a very comfy position. Todd smells really nice and he is close enough that Dirk now can stick his nose into the short hair just by his ear, where it is speckled with beginning grey. He has sort of wanted to stick his nose in there ever since he met Todd, so it’s not like he’s not grateful to the universe when it so amply provides.

“No, usually you are a lot more forward,” Todd said belligerently and tucks Dirks arm closer around himself.

“I am?”

“Ugh, you are hopeless today, “ Todd says and twists around again and kissed him.

Dirk was stunned. Of course he had always suspected that he possessed a certain animal magnetism, which was probably appealing to a whole host of people, Todd included, but this was the first time it had actually worked. And with such stunning success!

Todd is warm and demanding in his arms,making little gasps and noises, pushing his hands up under Dirk’s sweater, stroking over his chest and back and everywhere, and it’s fast and messy and absolutely wonderful. Dirk has thought about kissing Todd in the same way he has idly thought about going to Antarctica, that is to say, he has always thought it would be cool to go there and might have spent hours trying to imagine what it would be like and every now and then reviewed his account and the various ways of getting there and concluded that his means are hopelessly short. Dirk has thought about kissing Todd in the same way he has thought about going to Antarctica, that is fondly, hopelessly and in great detail.

Which is when it occurs to Dirk that he is dreaming.

At first it is incredibly disappointing (Todd is not actually here! Of course he would never kiss Dirk if he actually was), then it is a huge relief (Todd is not captured! Hooray!), and then its disappointing again (he can’t believe he falls for this _every_ time! He has had so many dreams about Todd and they _always_ get him. Even the one where he was an electric eel).

Todd breaks off the kiss and looks displeased at Dirk. “You’re not paying attention,” he accuses petulantly, and kisses Dirks nose.

“I, ahem, I...” Dirk tries to say but it’s very distracting the way Todd is dropping little kisses on his forehead and along his jaw, nuzzling and nipping. This is so nice its very difficult to remember that Todd is just a dream and it’s not really happening. Dirk just drifts for a bit and lets himself be kissed and nuzzled and rubbed up against. Todd feels exceedingly nice and smells just right, like Dirk remembers. His olfactory organ must be pretty amazing if it can reconstruct it so well after just a few tantalizing whiffs months and months ago. His own hands stray from Todd’s collarbones, to his surprisingly muscular arms, and his smooth back. Todd fits himself along his side, head pillowed on his arm and throws his legs over Dirk’s hips so they are neatly slotted against each other. It feels really nice, probably the first nice thing he has felt since Blackwing got him.

And it’s not even real. The thought makes Dirk’s heart contract sharply in pain, and he has to break the kiss off and just gasp for a second, leaning his forehead against Todd’s.

Todd makes an extremely displeased sound when Dirk stops kissing him, his nails scraping over Dirk’s skin leaving a stinging trail. He looks amazing, cheeks slightly pink and his smiling, and his eyes are so blue, they must be the bluest eyes in history. Dirk loves him so much he feels like his heart going to explode. He felt like that sometimes on the case, when Todd did something particularly assisting or said he was Dirks friend. Dirks should probably feel guilty about having this sort of dreams about his first and best friend. He would probably feel more guilty if it didn’t feel so bloody good.

“Come on, “ Todd mutters pulling at Dirk’s sweater, trying to get it over his head and giggling softly when it get stuck over his head. “Your hair has changed,” he says running his fingers through it.

“I know, they cut it. I hate it. I look like a wanker,” Dirk says pushing a little against Todd’s fingers so he’ll scratch it with his short fingernails.

Todd’s face scrunches and he pulls away a little, “Blackwing did this? They cut your hair?” he asks, looking befuddled. Dirk has long since accepted that Todd can on occasion be a little slow and apparently this applies to dream-Todd as well. “That has never happened before,” Todd says, looking surprised.

“ _This_ has never happened before either,” Dirk points out helpfully and motions between them, “I mean technically it’s not even happening right now, since I’m obviously dreaming.”

Todd goes sort of still in his arms and gives him a sort of squinty look. “Dirk?” he says slowly.

“Yes?”

Todd doesn't answer instead he just stares at Dirk as if he is trying to bore a hole through his skull with his eyes, slackjawed.

“What?” Dirk asks, kind of wondering how they went from all that nice kissing to this, Todd is pale as milk with a dawning expression of horror on his face.

“Dirk, this is really you?”

“Of course it is me, silly. You know, for being an assistant detective this whole ‘detecting’ thing does not come...” and at this point Todd yelps and and pushes away so suddenly and with so much force he actually falls out of the bed. “...naturally to you,” Dirk finishes, leaning over the edge of the bed to peer down at him.

“No, you don’t get it, it’s really you” Todd says breathlessly and completely nonsensically. Surging up from the floor to hug Dirk, sort of mashing him uncomfortably against his bony shoulder. And then he turned beet red and promptly backed off again, suddenly very preoccupied with the hem of his shirt.

“I, huh, I... “ he stuttered. “I though, I thought I was dreaming. I was dreaming about you? You should tell me something I couldn’t possibly know.”

“But that’s like a lot of things Todd,” Dirk says and Todd started giggling somewhat hysterically, still on the floor.

“And besides I am dreaming, not you, you are just a figment of my subconscious.”

“That’s the whole point Dirk, you _are_ dreaming, but _I’m_ dreaming too. You are in my dream. Or I’m in yours, I’m not sure. ”

“Oh? “ Dirk said and then more excitedly “Oh! OH! Thats brilliant, how ever did we manage that?”

“I have absolutely no idea,” Todd answered fervently, still giggling. “You must have done it somehow.”

“I have _not_ , I don’t even know what I have done. I’m not psychic you know, and have absolutely no parapsychological powers.”

“I know, I know that,” Todd says soothingly, “But you are a hell of a lot more not psychic than I am so it has to be you, somehow.”

Dirk huffs crossing his arms over his chest, only then realising he is actually shirtless. “Hang about a minute, this...” he gestured towards the expanse of skinny chest, “... happens in your dreams about me?”

Todd went violently red again. “You didn’t exactly complain!”

“I thought it was a dream!”

“Well, so did I!”

“But you said it had happened before, that you’ve dreamt this before.”

“I...that's possibly true but that doesn’t mean anything.”

“You _fancy_ me,” Dirk crowed victoriously. Todd was going to be the best assistant ever and probably look at him admiringly when he cleverly solved cases and possibly rip his shirt off when Dirk got heroically wounded. It was going to be the best. On the floor Todd glowered at him, as best he could.

“Dirk, we have just discovered that we can communicate in our dreams and this is how you want to spend that time?”

Dirk scowled at him “If you want to put it that way,” he said sourly and put his shirt back on.

As it turned out, being able to communicate in dreams was a nifty trick but not altogether that useful. Facts tended to be a little mutable and elusive, and keeping focused on what was what was surprisingly difficult. And it was not that much Dirk could say that was tangible and useful. He was in an underground facility, he didn’t know where, he didn’t know what date it was (he had been gone three months Todd told him), he was not sure how many people were in the facility, he had not seen the three missing members of the Rowdy Three. “How many guards?” Todd asked “Four, maybe eight? They change them around. I get the feeling one of them is called Phil, he feels like he should be called Phil, or maybe Roderick.” Dirk chewed his lower lip while thinking over the possible Roderickness of Phil.

Todd was sitting cross legged next to Dirk in the bed, frowning hard and trying to remember everything he was finding out. He had not asked Dirk if he was okay, or how he was doing but Dirk got it. He had not asked Todd either, he was also afraid of the answer. Todd looked paler with dark circles under his eyes and he was twitchy, constantly checking his hands. Now that he knew about Dirk could see the room changing, dream like. Little things that had not occurred to him earlier, the blanket in his bed the wrong colour, a potted plant in the corner, the door having almost cartoon-like iron bars.

“So you don’t know how many guards?”

“More than two, fewer than 15?” Dirk shrugged.

Todd sighed, “At least that’s something for Farah to work with,” he said. He shifted in the bed and his arm brushed against Dirk’s and suddenly Dirk was very very distracted. The knowledge that Todd didn’t mind touching him, even _wanted_ to touch him, was suddenly an overwhelming dizzying rush. His mouth was very dry and whatever he had been going to say only came out as a small strangled noise. Todd looked up at him and their eyes caught and held, Dirk had a hard time looking at anything other than his mouth. Todd had kissed him, Todd might potentially kiss him again. Todd might potentially kiss him again _right now_.

“I…” Todd said and his tongue darted out to wet his lips.

“Uh…” “Uh uh, yeah,” Dirk answered weakly. The air felt like molasses and the only thought Dirk could hold in his head was that Todd was _right there_ , and that suddenly, wildly _anything_ could happen.

Instead there was an ear-splitting noise, shrill and horrible, exactly like: “Oh fuck, my alarm!” Todd exclaimed, a look of horror on his face. “Shit!”

Around them the dream was already dissolving fast, the corners of the room disappearing like running sand. Todd was gripping him desperately, “Dirk, Dirk we will come for you I swear. Farah and I will come, we’ll get you out of here, I swear,” Todd said, hands gripping Dirk’s shoulders in an increasingly fainter hold. Dirk nodded mutely unable to speak, fingers knotting in Todd’s t-shirt, the fabric dissolving in his hands. “We will come, I promise,” Todd said and kissed him, biting and desperate and Dirk managed to wrap his arms around him, and hold him for a second before he was gone.

 

Dirk blinked up against the ceiling, the scratchy grey blanket wrapped around him like a snake and his pillow on the floor. And for the first time in months Dirk had faith in the universe, he was exactly where he was supposed to be because he was there, he was waiting for Farah and Todd to come and rescue him. Stretching Dirk sat up, slowly sniffing the stale underground air, today was going to be interesting. He definitely had a hunch.


End file.
